Little Wing
by Tillian
Summary: Beneath Benezia's strong political stance was a simple loving mother who doted on her only daughter, Liara. The cruel galactic society around them and Benezia's political ambition for her daughter, deteriorated their relationship as time went on.


_This is an exploration of the story where the mother and daughter relationship of Liara and Benezia deteriorated as time goes by due to their different philosophies with the galactic life where it leads up to Benezia's death. So here's my attempt in portraying Benezia as a mother. Will post more up depending of time and mood. Enjoy_

_Disclaimer obligations: Everything that is Mass Effect belongs to BioWare

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**Prologue**

**Last Breath**

_The Scream  
Of an illegitimate voice_

_It has ceased to hear itself, therefore  
It asked itself_

_How do I exist?_

_-Adrienne Rich, Cartography of Silence_

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The drumming noise of gunfire had died down as the smell of blood and the residual smoke lingered inside the laboratory. The eerie, unnatural silence floated gently in the air. An asari matriarch in her prime looked down weakly at her daughter and her turian friend, who watched her with uneasiness while she clutched her stomach. A small trickle of blood poured out from her fingers as she took a long, steady gaze at the human woman. The human was still clutching her pistol but something had changed inside her eyes; remorse, regret and anguish had dulled her eyes, once lit with a spark of bold confidence. The matriarch gave the human a weak smile as she finally began to respect her integrity. With great effort, she began to speak to her daughter.

"Liara… I'm always proud of you."

"Mother!" Liara yelled as she began rushing towards her. As she was trying to reach to her, the human woman quickly grabbed the asari girl by the arm and began to drag her back with great effort.

"Shepard…what are you _doing_?"

"Benezia is still under the influence of Saren. She's still a danger to us all."

"Mother is dying," Liara began to weep. She looked helplessly across the room as her mother began to slowly drag herself up, giving them a wistful look. Liara began to fight off Shepard's grasp, trying to twist her arm to loosen the Spectre's firm grip. She felt a painful jab in her heart as she watched her mother breathing heavily and trying to hide the pained expression on her face.

As Liara cried and continued to scream out "Mother," Shepard couldn't handle the situation anymore. Quickly she spun the distressed asari around, wanting to see her face clearly before she shook her hard.

"Liara! Get a grip! I can't let you endanger yourself!" Shepard's voice began to tremble as her authoritative tone eroded away, revealing a soft-spoken, remorseful pitch. "I don't want you to get hurt," she insisted, "and I don't want to see you killed by your own mother… I'm doing this for Benezia's sake". She paused. "And mine."

Shepard's grip loosened as she let Liara go. The asari began to sob uncontrollably before she leaned over Shepard's shoulder and hid her face behind her embrace. Shepard began to pat her back, trying to soothe her sorrow. While she fought her body's reactions, refusing to let the pooling tears spill from the corners of her eyes, Shepard tilted her head upwards.

Liara turned her head up to where her mother law crumpled and saw Benezia clutch her head hard, her face twisted with great pain and discomfort. She pushed Shepard away and looked over at Benezia's direction as her mother began to scream in her agony. "You have to… stop me, Shepard! His teeth at my ears… fingers at my _spine_!"

She screamed in pain, still clutching her head, then turned her back away from them as she began to sob quietly. Her voice shuddered as she tried to command Shepard to eliminate her. "You should… you should…"

"Mother! Don't leave… fight him! Fight his control!" As Liara yelled she gripped her hands into a tight fist, showing the white knuckles through her smooth, azure skin.  
Then all the sudden, a violet aura radiated around Benezia's body. The matriarch turned her whole body to face them.

To Liara's shock, Benezia's eyes no longer glimmered faintly with motherly kindness; instead her eyes brightened with murderous impulse. "You should… all die."

Her dark lips curled into a malevolent smirk as everyone gave her a startled look while preparing to have their weapons in position. The turian stumbled while Shepard quickly caught him from falling.

"Shepard… she's…?"

"Garrus…She's no longer Benezia…" Shepard twisted her lips into a painful remorse as she began to put her shotgun into her position, "We have no other choice…"

Before she finished, Benezia knocked Garrus and Liara to the other side of the room with her biotics. Shepard started to run to a nearby crate and hid there as Benezia strode angrily towards her. She took a deep breath as she switched her shotgun into Carnage mode, then bit her bottom lip out of nervousness.

She quickly poked herself out from the crate and fired but Benezia's biotic shields kept her body unharmed. Then the matriarch used her biotic abilities to toss Shepard's gun aside before she pulled Shepard towards herself with a strong invisible force, throwing her harshly, close to her side with her face flat down on the ground. Before Shepard could get herself up, Benezia clutched her neck tightly and began to suffocate the human spectre. As Benezia was tightening the grip around her neck, she looked into Shepard's eyes.

The large, green emerald eyes began to dull as life slipped away from her grasp. She wanted to stop herself, killing the spectre with her own hands, but she just couldn't. The indoctrination seeped fast into her mind, forcing her to kill the human who, all along, had protected her own daughter with her life. She wanted to cry at this sorrowful experience that she was forced to deal with but she couldn't. She could still hear Saren's voice echo into her mind. _Crying is for the weak… kill her._

As Shepard was about to cough her last breath, her eyes began to close, a piecing gunshot echoed in the room. Then laboratory became still again while Shepard collapsed onto the ground, she was gasping for air while the matriarch slumped gently to the ground beside her. They both looked up and saw Liara looking down on them, sobbing while still clutching her pistol, a tiny stream of smoke coming out and indicating to them both that she had pulled the trigger. She tossed the pistol aside and rush to Shepard's side while Garrus began limping towards her.

As they helped Shepard to get onto her feet, Benezia reached her hand, yearning to hold her daughter's hand one last time. Liara looked at Shepard for permission and the human weakly nodded back at her before she continued to cough. Then Liara reached down to Benezia's side and gently griped her hand while lifting her to cradle her mother's head close to her chest. Benezia looked as her weakly and her vivid blue eyes began to dim as life to slowly slip away from her body.

Right before her eyes, she saw herself singing a gentle lullaby to Liara while lulling her to sleep when she was still merely a child. Back when she was merely a simple mother during her matron phase. Before she became a political figure. Tears sprung out from her eyes as she felt a deep nostalgia and yearned for the simpler times. How she wished she and Liara would run away from Saren, from the Reaper ship and away from politics, living out a humbled life once more, in a small cottage deep in the Thessian mountains. However, she knew that chance could never be as she knew her time is coming to an end.

She desperately looked up as she glazed into Liara's eyes. Her daughter eyes reminded her of the girl's father, who was an asari. Her first love. She then twisted her head as she looked over Shepard, who was looking down on her as she tried to look through her supplies.

"Hang on! We have medi-gel! We could…"

"No!" Benezia desperately cried out loud, "My mind is not the same and I will not be myself… ever again!"

She then looked back into her daughter's eye, her large childish eyes, flooding with tears as it trickled down her cheeks. Her light sky-blue eyes gave Benezia some solace, making her feel that her lover didn't left her side after all. Those same eyes looking down on her now. She gave Liara a weak, gentle smile before she drew up her last breath.

"Goodnight Little wing… I'll see you at the dawn."

"Mother! No, don't leave me!"

But Benezia closed her eyes to the galaxy one last time. The memories of her past that passed by through her eyes began to fade away like a the ember that died down into a lifeless charcoal.


End file.
